Hotel Delay Sounds Sour Note For Festival Fans

HAMPTON — The Embassy Suites won't open in time to host those attending this weekend's jazz fest.

At the new Embassy Suites Hotel next to the Hampton Roads Convention Center, the elevators have carried queen-size sleeper sofas and refrigerators up to the top floors. The indoor pool and hot tub have been installed. And the plumbing, electrical wiring and air conditioning systems are in place.

FOR THE RECORD - Published correction ran Wednesday, June 29, 2005.The Hampton Roads Convention Center was misidentified as the Hampton Roads Convocation Center in the June 19 Sports section and as the Hampton Convention Center in Saturday's Local News section. (Text corrected.)

But the hotel, which was to open in plenty of time to accommodate Hampton Jazz Festival fans this weekend, now isn't expected to be open until mid-July.

"The original opening date was actually in mid-May and then pushed back to June," said Sam Martinette, media strategist for the Hampton Convention and Visitor Bureau. "Then, six weeks ago, the Embassy Suites owner, John Q. Hammons, decided to not open the property until mid-July."

Hotel workers in May informed 250 guests bound for the jazz festival that the hotel couldn't accommodate them and helped them find rooms at other local hotels.

"Some opted to find accommodations on their own," said Jarratt Watkins, general manager of the Hampton Embassy Suites. "A few people were upset."

The Springfield, Mo.,-based hotel owner and operator, John Q. Hammons Hotels, decided to delay opening the property until it was completely finished. (John Q. Hammons recently was named Developer of the Year for the Embassy Suites brand name of the Hilton Hotels Corporation.)

The company building the hotel, CDI Contractors of Little Rock, Ark., got backed up this winter due to weather delays.

"The delay is due to a little of everything," Watkins said. "The fire marshal can't test the building until all the smoke detectors are installed. It could be one thing that ties up five or six."

The Hampton Jazz Festival weekends bring some of the best business of the year to area hotels, local hoteliers say.

"It's one of the few times there is more than enough business to go around," said Joyce Byington-Clark, sales manager at the Clarion Hotel Hampton. "Some of the same people have been staying with us for 20 years. They are very loyal to the Jazz Festival."

Even though the Embassy Suites hotel is nearly complete, Hammons is known as a perfectionist who did not want customers staying in an unfinished building, Martinette said.

"They don't want to open the property with pipes covered up with drapes and a jackhammer going off at the other end of a room," Martinette said."They want the hotel to be perfect when it opens, and we respect him for that." *